Financially Fit Post #3
(I originally posted these on my FB page, they got posted in the wrong order on my blog. I could have renamed them but it would make things confusing. It's just best to admit I screwed up. )
Shiny New Things Are Nice But Not When Our Growth is Stagnant
Some of current council have been speaking about building new recreational facilities instead of fixing the old ones. We are given the estimated costs of repairs but are given nothing about what a new facility would cost, not even a ballpark figure.
Not what I’d call Financially Fit. I might consider the shiny new things but not until I have cost estimates.
According to the Parks and Recreation Report (pg 24 of Oct 4 Agenda), we already have more recreational facilities than other cities our size. However, our growth has stagnated since 2009.
https://regionaldashboard.alberta.ca/region/medicine-hat/population/#/?from=2011&to=2020
From 2001-2009, we grew by 17%. (9138, 1142/yr)
From 2009- 2017 we grew by 5%. (3059, 382/yr) From 2017-2020, we grew by 1% (723, 90/yr)
We are at 168 out of 209 growing communities. The rest of the 419 communities are either in neutral or shrinking.
https://regionaldashboard.alberta.ca/#/explore-an-indicator?i=population&d=PercentChange5Years
Why?
Aidrie grew by 25% in 5 years, Cochrane by 29.5%. Spruce Grove nearly 16%, Lethbridge 8.7%. Other cities are growing at a much faster rate while we’re stuck in low gear. Obviously people need more than low taxes and shiny new things to make the move here.
We need to do something different. If we keep going like we are, we will enter the list of communities losing population.
I found this information on my own in 20 minutes. Why hasn’t current council noticed? We should have been working on a new strategy for attracting residents since we noticed the significant decline, surely we keep records of this sort of thing.
Shiny new things are not the answer. We need to be prepared for the worst, if we start losing population. From the looks of things, it may be very soon.
That’s Financially Fit.
#financiallyfit #kelly4mhcc #stagnantgrowth #shinynewthings #domorewithless #tourism #airdrie #lethbridge #cochrane #sprucegrove #yxh #medicinehat #parksandrecreation